Many call LinkedIn the “set it and forget it” social media. It’s a great professional network, but not as fast-paced as Twitter, and not as fun and interactive as Facebook. But, we all love LinkedIn for the professional quality it brings to the table. There are however three really cool things about LinkedIn that not a lot of real estate professionals seem to know about.

Here are three of my favorite LinkedIn “secrets” that are ideal for real estate professionals:

1.. Export your connections and add to your database
This is a fantastic feature! Did you know you could export all of your LinkedIn contacts? Go to “My Connections” to view a list of all your LinkedIn contacts. At the bottom of the page click “Export Connections,” which will put all this contact info in a format that works for your address book (Microsoft Outlook, Yahoo! Mail, etc.). This is an easy way to add 50, 100 even 500 people to you database. Add them to your drip email marketing campaigns, send them an invite to join you on Facebook or Twitter – the possibilities are endless!

2. Customize your URL
This is huge – instead of having a long URL that no one remembers, secure a custom URL on LinkedIn. Visit the “Edit Profile” tab and click “Public Profile” at bottom left. Once you’re on this page, on the far right you will see “Your current URL.” This is where you can customize your LinkedIn domain name so you can better brand your account. Your URL may want to be your name or your business – I recommend staying consistent with how you are branding yourself on your website, Facebook page, blog, etc. You can think take this custom URL and add it to your Facebook page, blog, website and email signature.

3. Check out “Signal” and read relevant news and updates
There is a new feature on LinkedIn called Signal which allows you to monitor updates within your network.  You can also filter information so you can also see what people in your extended network (2nd and 3rd connections) are posting. You can also do the same filtering by industry or location. I could see this as a really useful tool for real estate agents who are trying to build their business and meet people outside of their inner circle. This is the new way to meet “a friend of a friend.”

I know there are so many more great ways to use LinkedIn – I only covered these three lesser-known facts. I’d love to hear from you how you are using LinkedIn. Leave me a comment below!

Written by: Katie Lance, Social Media Director, Inman News, @katielance

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I had the pleasure of speaking to Marnie Blanco, Vice President, eBusiness at RE/MAX. I first heard Marnie speak at Real Estate Connect NYC a few months back and was really impressed by what she had to say about social media and what RE/MAX was doing on a corporate level – but also to support their agents in the fast-changing social media world.

Best Practice Over Policy

When asked about policy around social media, Marnie says that they focus more on “best practice” over policy. She says,

“We can always do more. We offer a lot of education to our agents and brokers about Facebook business pages, Twitter, the ROI of social media, rules and regulations and best practices. RE/MAX is an extremely entrepreneurial brokerage, so we encourage everyone to get involved in social media and then we give them the tools to make the best possible decisions.

I asked Marnie about what she says when agents ask her “where to start.” Many agents get overwhelmed with the number of options and seemingly never-ending stream of new technology. Marnie advises: “Start as you intend to go.” RE/MAX encourages their agents and brokers to get educated first about the different mediums and then decide the role they’d like to play.

Social Media Education

Social Media superstar, Gary Vaynerchuk was a recent keynote speaker just a few weeks ago at RE/MAX’s convention. Marnie said that Gary talked about how he felt like right now there is a four-year window in social media – right now everyone is on it – but everyone can really capitalize on it in the next four years.

The social media education that RE/MAX provides includes training agents on the separating some of the personal and business that happens on social media and the importance of relationship building – not just promoting their listings. They recommend LinkedIn as a great starting point, because an agent is not expected to be on LinkedIn 24/7 – there is a low barrier to entry and an easy starting point.

I asked Marnie about Twitter and she said they don’t do as much Twitter training as they do with Facebook. She says that Twitter is a great listening tool. “On Twitter it is important to hear what is being said, interject when you can, and then tie it back to you when it is appropriate.” But, she said, it is not for everyone.

In addition to conventions, RE/MAX also offers a number of webinars as their ongoing social media education with agents and brokers. At their conventions, they strive to have speakers that are really on the cutting edge of social media like Gary Vaynerchuk and Nicole Nicolay (Nicole is also one of our emcees at the Agent Reboot evenst that are happening nationwide)

Providing Opportunities

They have social media tracks at their conventions and at their last convention – they had a “Twitter Lover’s Lounge” where people could meet “in real life” and do some great face to face networking. Also at many conventions, they provide camera crews onsite who are available to film a short professional message for agents on a one-on-one basis. These videos could then be published on the agent’s web site or blog. Marnie says that RE/MAX feels it’s very important to assist their agents in creating content for their social sites. In addition, agents are encouraged and trained to start a YouTube Channel of their own and then link their channel to our RE/MAX dedicated channel in which can share content across.  It creates a bigger reach for the agents at a local and national level.

Training on Demand

RE/MAX also offers “RE/MAX University” which Marnie calls “Training on Demand.” At their headquarters in Colorado, they have a full television production area where they are able to create “Quick Hit” 3-5 minute training videos that can then be passed onto the brokerage level. She also said they like to take their training on the road, and will travel to various offices, and get very hands-on with agents and their computers.

Agents and Brokers Doing it Right

Here are 5 RE/MAX Facebook pages that are doing a really nice job of providing local content, building a community and engaging their audience:

• RE/MAX Real Estate Concepts
• RE/MAX Southern Shores
• RE/MAX Gateway of the Washington DC Metro Area
• Cory Kramer- Re/Max Agent
• McCoy-Freeman Group RE/MAX ELITE

How is This Going to Create More Business?

Marnie says at the end of the day, you have to ask yourself “How is this going to create more business?” With social media it is not always that tangible. What I like about RE/MAX’s approach is they are putting a creative focus on the basics of the tried and true approaches, are embracing change and new technologies and arming their agents with the tools and education to succeed.

You can find RE/MAX on Facebook here and on Twitter here.

What type of social media training is your brokerage doing? Are you an agent or broker with RE/MAX?  I’d love to get your thoughts and opinions – leave me a comment below!

Written by: Katie Lance, Social Media Director, Inman News, @katielance

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Last week LinkedIn achieved over 100 million members and published this infographic:

Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn said:

“We’re now growing at roughly one million new LinkedIn members every week, the equivalent of a professional joining the site at faster than one member per second.”

Are you on LinkedIn? We’d love to hear how you are using LinkedIn to network and grow your business. Leave us a comment below!

Written by: Katie Lance, Senior Marketing Manager, Inman News, @katielance

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Guest blog post by David Cummins co-founder of Faceified

Frequently updated Twitter account? Check. Slick Facebook Page? Check. Dedicated YouTube channel? Check.

Here’s the thing: your potential customers don’t go to these respective social media sites looking to buy or rent property.

Let me repeat, buyers don’t shop on social media sites!

While having a strong social media presence enhances your personal brand, social media should be utilized as a compliment to your other online marketing efforts. Selection is what attracts buyers. When it comes to breadth of selection of real estate on the web, Craigslist reigns supreme.

Below I will discuss how cross-promoting, personalizing, and measuring your listings’ performance will help you build your online reputation and generate more leads on classifieds sites like Craigslist. I will also describe how Faceified can help you get started generating more leads.

Cross-promotion: Show buyers what you’ve got. Before potential customers even begin to care about your brand or reputation, they want to feel like you might have the property they are looking for. If you don’t have what buyers want, they’re on to the next listing. The best way to give buyers that warm a fuzzy feeling is to use each listing as a window into as many of your other listings as possible.

Cross-promoting your listings will maximize the number your listings that each person sees and increase the number of leads you generate. When someone views one of your listing, this should just be the tip of the iceberg. Make it easy for interested parties to discover your other listings.

Personalization: Buyers want to see the person & reputation behind the listing. Once you’ve demonstrated to buyers that you have one or more properties that roughly fits their requirements, buyers will then ask themselves “can I trust this real estate agent?” Your reputation is your biggest asset, and you should proactively use it to help you sell.

Just like in the offline world, your face and reputation should be visible and accessible from all of your listings. It isn’t enough to have static testimonials tucked away on your website or ratings scattered around the web. Your reputation must be consolidated, portable, and visible in all of your listings. Buyers looking at your listings want to see your face, read reviews from your past customers, and get a sense of who you are via your social media presences while they are looking at your listings (i.e. in the buying mood). Make it easy for them to do that!

Performance: Do more of what works and less of what doesn’t. While it is true that it doesn’t cost anything to post listings on many classifieds sites, that doesn’t mean that posting is free. Your time is valuable, so it is important to clearly understand which strategies for posting to classifieds sites move the needle and which ones are holding you back.

A classifieds listing is an ad. Like any other online advertiser, you should be constantly measuring the performance of your listings. Many real estate agents know how many phone calls they get per day but not much else. For instance, do you know how many views each of your listings receives? Do you know which title or body generates the most interest from buyers?

Without this type of insight, it’s impossible to know if the 5 calls you got yesterday is a good yield or not. Actively measuring, testing, tweaking, and optimizing your classifieds listings is essential for making the most efficient use of your time and generating more leads online.

Ok, I get it. How do I get started? We built a free tool called Faceified to help you generate more leads by personalizing each listing, cross-promoting and measuring listing performance, and unlocking your online reputation with customer reviews.

Here’s how it works:

1. Personalize your classifieds listings with your Faceified Seal. Inserting your Seal into all of your listings will bring instant personalization to your listings, helping you to stand out. Simply create a Faceified account (it’s free), fill in your profile information, and copy the code of your Faceified Seal. It takes 2 minutes.

Paste your Seal code into your Craigslist listings, and your Seal will be visible to buyers

People who view your listings can click on your Seal to read your profile information on Faceified and discover your social media presences on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, and more.

2. Cross-Promote your listings and track performance. People who click on your Seal are able to see all of your other listings that also contain your Seal. Inserting your Seal into as many of your listings as possible enables you to expose you listings to as many people as possible, maximizing the leads you generate.

You will also be able to see valuable analytics data about your listings (i.e. # a views today, # of views overall, etc.), which will help you to tweak and optimize your listing performance.

3. Enhance your reputation by requesting reviews from customers. No reputation is complete without reviews. Potential customers love to hear what your past customers say about you.

Use Faceified to request reviews from your past customers. When buyers click on your Seal they’ll be able to read real reviews from your past customers, increasing trust and helping you to stand out. You have complete control over who reviews you.

Now it is time for you to get busy building your reputation and generating more leads by personalizing, cross-promoting, and tracking the performance of your listings. Give Faceified a try www.faceified.com and let us know what you think.

Feel free to send your thoughts, comments, and suggestions to support@faceified.com

About the author: David Cummins is an entrepreneur and co-founder, along with Manyu Lui, of Silicon Valley-based Faceified ( www.faceified.com ).  Faceified is a service that helps real estate agents unlock their reputations and generate more leads on classifieds sites.  You can follow Faceified on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/faceified

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Guest Blogger, Mike Bowler, Sr. has been in the real estate business (Lansing, MI) for the past 32 years. During that time he’s educated and consulted with hundreds of REALTORS. Mike is a former owner/broker of Coldwell Banker Bowler Real Estate and is currently an Associate Broker for Coldwell Banker Hubbell Briarwood in Lansing Michigan, who bought his company in 2001. He also owns his own company PRETEC (Professional Resources, E-Business, Technology, Education, & Consulting) and is an avid fan of social media in the workplace. Mike was named in 2009’s Top 25 Most Connected Real Estate Professionals by PROXIO and selected by Inman News as one of the 50 Most Influential Online.

This may appear to be basic for some who read this Blog, however my experience has been that most real estate agents have not yet designed a plan to make sure they are being found online. Some real estate agents have good intentions, set up a few sites and forget them. This is worse than not having any profiles at all.

The guidelines below can be expanded over time; however, it’s just a plan to get you started in the right direction. Remember that your goal is to drive traffic to your listings, your services, and develop relationships that will result into a face-to-face contact. This is still a “people business.”

Nearly everything below is free or very affordable, however you must be willing to invest the time for setup and a certain amount of time every day to work your plan. If you’re not willing to do that, then hire someone to set you up and assist you to get started or don’t do it at all. This is by no means an overnight success for getting found online. If you don’t think you need it, just go “Google yourself” (Google search your name inside quotation marks) and do some soul searching about your future.

So, here’s my proposed plan:

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Guest Blogger, Suzanne Roy is Lead Contributor with Tech Savvy Agent and Owner of V.A. Work, and has been working with Real Estate Agents throughout North America since 2002 – initially as a virtual assistant, and more recently as a social media specialist, concentrating her efforts in assisting Real Estate Agents with blog design, content and syndication, custom Fan Page designing, keyword research and search engine optimization.

The World Wide Web (better known as “www”) is described by Wikipedia as “a system of interlinked hypertext documents accessed via the Internet.”  Just less than 20 years ago, August 6th, 1991, was the official debut date of the “www.”

More recently, (over the past 6 years) Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, Yelp and scores of other social networking sites have taken the World Wide Web to a completely different level; one that, without some strategic planning, can become, overwhelming in a split second.

Real Estate Agents have the ability to market themselves and their specific areas of expertise to millions of people through social networking and media sites – taking their offline marketing (such as recipe postcards and local football team schedules) completely out of the picture – Thank God!  Oh, and without costing a penny either…

So where do you begin to create your own social web?  Well, the true heart to all your online marketing and social web integration has to start with your blog.  No, not your website – your BLOG.  And not just any blog – a self-hosted blog – meaning one that you are in control over, you have the complete rights to, one that is a standalone site, and not embedded into another.  Godaddy is an excellent option for getting this set up easily, since they have a direct link to Wordpress blog hosting and can be linked to one of your purchased url’s.  But that’s another post for another day…

Integrating your social networking profiles with your blog allows you to have your own social web of content and information.  Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIN are what make up the most dense population of eyeballs that will see your content and get traffic to your blog.   So with this in mind, here is a step-by-step guide on how to make your own social web and get your information found consistently.

1.  Self-Hosted Blog to Facebook Fan Page

Facebook has an encyclopedia full of applications that can be utilized on your Fan Page and, in this case, your blog.  NetworkedBlogs is an excellent application which allows you to automatically upload your new blog content to your Facebook Fan Page with a simple process as shown in the video below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rW84XruyPTI

2.  Facebook Fan Page to Twitter

Utilizing the same Facebook application – NetworkedBlogs – you can link your Fan Page up with your Twitter account simply and effectively:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JKpbwZtJ14

3.  Twitter to LinkedIn

There are probably dozens of different ways to go about accomplishing having your Twitter account linked to your LinkedIn profile, but here’s the easiest route we have found to make this circle complete:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmriAbdGFxs

Now, when you post your daily blog (ok, weekly?!), your hyper-local content will be broadcast throughout these three massively trafficked sites with the simple push of the “Publish” button.

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I consider myself someone who is ‘in the thick of it’ – in terms of social media. I manage all the social media channels for Inman News and because of that I always keep one eye on what real estate agents and brokerages are doing in the social media world. I currently follow about 500 real estate pages and close to 400-500 real estate people on Twitter plus I have another 200-300 LinkedIn real estate connections. Through all of these ‘connections’ – it gives me a birds eye view on who is really mastering this marketing tool.

As you all know, simply creating an account on Facebook or Twitter rarely equates to being plugged in. The most common reason for not spending time on developing a social media strategy is that real estate agents and brokers fear there will be little to no return on investment – and that frankly ‘it’s just too much work’ or ‘I don’t have the time.’

Here are 3 common mistakes that I see real estate agents and brokers doing all the time:

1. Doing too much at once. For people in real estate, it’s often best to start with a small social media presence. Check out LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter – which one appeals to you the most? The one that makes the most sense to you should be your starting point. Start there and then set goals for when you will branch out onto other channels.

2. Giving it to the intern. Too often, social media responsibilities will be piled on the most inexperienced assistants or worse, someone who detests social media. If you are going to hire someone to help you manage your social media, make sure you hire someone who is not only savvy in communcation, but comfortable with exposure to the public.  Social media needs a personal touch and someone who is aggressive and strategic.

3. Making conversations one-way. Too many real estate agents and brokers just see social media tools as just another way to push out information. Bombarding people with listings won’t earn many followers, there has to be a dialogue that keeps the audience engaged. Remember, less about you and more about the people receiving the information – always ask yourself, ‘what’s in it for them?’

So, now what? How do you know if your successful or not? One of the easiest things to do is to monitor your web site and blog traffic. Make sure you have Google Analytics set up on your site and that once a week you are looking at where your traffic is coming from.

Here are a few real estate Facebook pages that in my opinion are doing a great job!

• The Corcoran Group
• Contra Costa Association of REALTORS
• The Dawn Thomas Team of Intero Real Estate Services
• PMZ Real Estate
• The Robin Milonakis Group, Official Fan Page
• ERA Real Estate

Bonus: Want to see an agent doing something fun and different on social media? Check out this great video from Ben Balsbaugh, an agent from PMZ Real Estate in Modesto. Awesome job creating something that is about him but in a fun way that makes people want to share it!

(Can’t see the video: click here to view on YouTube)

What mistakes are you seeing real estate agents do with social media? Would love your feedback, please leave me a comment below!

Written by: Katie Lance, Marketing Manager, Inman News

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I have been thinking a lot about social media lately. Inevitably when I talk to someone outside of the social media/facebook/twitter world I always get a few snickers or questions like “does that really work?” Believe it or not, I don’t just cross my fingers and ‘hope’ it works!

Here are some of my thoughts – I know some of these are so basic but they are the heart of why I wholeheartedly believe in what I do and what motivates me everyday!

1. People are connected to you because they have volunteered to hear from you! Think about it – they clicked a button and chose to listen to you and be connected to you. They have raised their hand and said ‘please send me messages about your business!’ If you have 500 people on your list, imagine a room of 500 people who asked to listen to you.

2. You should post content that is interesting to you – that YOU  would want to share! People share info because they want to, because there is very little ‘pitch’ and because they feel good about passing it on. Social media is a reputation and client builder.

3. Do you find yourself marketing to the same people over and over again? Social media exists for sharing and expanding your reach. It’s one of the ways you grow your audience without paying a single dime!

4. Social media is very different than email. Email is definitely important BUT different than social media. You can forward an email – but you you forward it to a couple people – but when your re-tweet or share something, you are forwarding to your whole audience.  So when you post something interesting and your friend re-posts it to their 100 friends and then someone re-posts it to their 1000 friends and then someone re-posts it to their 10,000 friends…. THIS is the power of social media! This is not happening on TV or radio – there is no way to share information easily until it comes to social media.

5. When someone posts a testimonial on social media – that is social proof. Do you ever read a testimonial on a printed page and wonder if it is real? When you read a testimonial or review on a social media site you know it is real!

6. Social media lives on. Yes it may only be visible in your feed for an hour or so depending on how many followers you have – but beyond that, it lives on. Social media stays on search to be found over and over.

4 things that I’ve done to be successful in social media:

1. I never forgot the brand or the best face I wanted to put forward.
2. I never played any games or paid money to get followers or friends.
3. I don’t publicly criticize or put anyone down.
4. I’m in this for the long term

Would love your opinion – please leave me a comment below!

Written by: Katie Lance, Marketing Manager, Inman News

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Measuring your success with social media is key. It’s one of the reasons I have a job  I really understand the importance of measuring what works and doesn’t work, looking at our click-through rates from Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, and how much traffic this drives to our website.

Along with Google Analytics, I utilize the statistical feature in Hootsuite. I think Hootsuite is a must for any social media manager or anyone who is consistently managing a social media campaign on different platforms.

Once you are logged into Hootsuite, to view your statistics, look at the lower-left hand corner of your screen and click the ‘Launch’ button:

From here you can check your stats summary or individual messages. If you click summary,this is what you will see: (you can choose to view: past 24 hours, 7 day stats, 30 days or custom view). I like this stat a lot because I can see my high traffic days – if you scroll your mouse of each day you will see exactly how many clicks you had that day. You can also print or download the stats into a .CSV file.

You can also see 2 graphs showing where your traffic is coming from – geographically and from which sites:

Below this drop down menu is an option to view popular tweets – it will show you the top 10 tweets and the amount of traffic you received. This is extremely helpful to see what types of tweets are successful and what are not.

Here is a great article I came across last week: The 13 Truths About Social Media Management- great tips and advice!

Of course, measuring the data is only part of managing the process. Now that you have this info – what do you do with it? I use this data 2 ways:

1. I look at the times of day and days of the week that are “peak times” and adjust my posting around that
2. I look at my top messages and look at the title and subject – sometimes the title is MORE important than the actual content of the article you are posting

What do you use to measure your ROI or progress with social media? Would love your feedback, please leave me a comment below!

Written by: Katie Lance, Marketing Manager, Inman News

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Nobody likes someone who is an ego-maniac. However, a lot of real estate agents get a bad rap, because some agents think that to build a great personal brand, they need to talk about how great they are.  This is very off-putting for many people – especially your Gen X and Gen Y clients who are slow to trust and quick to judge anyone who calls themselves an ‘expert.’

Personal branding – the art of packaging and presenting yourself has become so vital to both career and business development – especially as a real estate agent.

Here are five simple strategies that real estate agents can use to instantly set themselves apart from the pack:

1. Craft a Compelling Pitch. You need to be able to clearly define yourself, and sum up precisely what it is you do, in 30 seconds or less. When in doubt, make a simple bullet point list of the skills you excel at. Ask yourself: How do I see myself? Your pitch needs to be brief, to the point.

2. Take Control of Your Your Name. Input your name or your business’s name in Google, and see what comes up. It’s vital that the majority of results that appear – especially the first ones, all speak to the same clear message. You should not only own a website with your personal name as the domain (a given, right?!) – you should also have profiles on all major social networking services (Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn) under the same name. Even if you plan to do nothing else on social media – as a minimum – set up your profile.

3. Create Strong Branding Platforms. Personal branding is about establishing yourself as someone that brings unique, indispensable real estate services and skills to the table. You need to create platforms (blogs, Facebook pages, online video channels, etc.) that can help broadcast your skills and experience to as many people as possible. All of these platforms should also be stamped with your signature name, logo and imagery. Once built, it pays to pump out content through them that illustrates your expertise.

4. Be Generous with Your Time. Acts of kindness and generosity serve to generate goodwill and help build invaluable relationships and contacts that can pay off immeasurably. Charitable work presents great opportunities to establish trust, grow your personal/professional network and make a positive impact – you never know when it might lead to a vital mention or referral. Go above and beyond the call of duty. It doesn’t just speak to personal values and work ethic. It also presents a prime opportunity to demonstrate your expertise.

5. Accessibility is the Name of the Game. Whether using blog posts, tweets or your professional Facebook page, accessibility is the name of the game. Not only do people need to know you’re out there – they also need to know where and how to reach you, that you’re available to connect as needed and will respond to requests for outreach in a timely fashion. This doesn’t mean having to broadcast your personal information to the world or staying up until 3 a.m. responding to 200 e-mails . But it does necessitate that you not build too many layers of insulation between yourself and incoming queries, and be respectful of acknowledging people’s questions and feedback (even if it’s just through a series of blog posts).

The bottom line: If you want to be a go-to real estate agent, you’ve got to earn people’s trust. That means being genuine, listening and responding quickly!

Bonus tip #1: At some point you will want to work with a professional designer to help create your brand for you – i.e. your look, logo, imagery, etc. Don’t take a short-cut! Hiring a designer will help save you time and money in the long-haul!

Bonus tip #2: Be respectful of your brokerage’s brand and image. Although you are independent, pay attention to style guides and/or branding standards your brokerage has published. There are so many ways to differentiate and brand yourself but still stay within your brokerage branding guidelines.

Would love your comments and feedback – please leave me a comment below!

Written by: Katie Lance, Marketing Manager, Inman News

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